Straitgate staff
The vigil team of 11 showed up Sunday at Scottsdale Bible Church (SBC) in posh north Scottsdale, Arizona. We were a perfect number to make sure every churchgoer knew of our presence there on a big “campus” with three services one after another. It was a rare cloudy morning in scorching Phoenix. SBC is a financial success story church with a membership of 6000.
Scottsdale Bible is thought of as Evangelical by most, but some members and observers consider it “Calvinistic,” being closely associated with a seminary of that ilk. Others would claim Scottsdale Bible exemplifies traditional “Christian, pro-life, pro-family values” and are not afraid to place pro-life Republicans on its podium and allow Republican campaign signs on its right-of-ways in front of the church. SBC has something for everyone and rides the middle ground on all, except when it comes to war, which it has yet to oppose.
Among those who stopped were several attendees of apparent Middle Eastern ethnicity. A lone Lebanese man came back twice to tell a vigil volunteer he was shocked to learn the public statements Pastor Darien made on TV about Israel’s right to destroy his native country.
A car full of Middle Eastern appearing attendees registered excitement and approval through the windows upon departing, but did not stop.
The Scottsdale Bible leadership played the friendly face for us. Some gooey love-churches serve coffee and donuts to the picketers while refusing to read our literature or look our signs straight in the eye. Not so at Scottsdale Bible, where at least four of the staff members came out to let us know they were open minded and accepted literature. We hope they studied it. Emeritus Pastor Darryl DelHousaye (who is going on to be the president of Phoenix Seminary) agreed to meet with us.
Feedback from all sides
Team members say they are detecting a marked change in drive-by attitudes… (Not one drive-by shooting occurred), and a lot thumbs up signs and car honks were offered to messages like “WHO WOULD JESUS BOMB,” and “CHOOSE LIFE, NOT WAR.” Our several first time vigil volunteers said they felt gratified by the experience and by the dynamics of the event.
One attractive woman going to church on her bicycle asked for literature. She misunderstood that Project Strait Gate was with the church opposing the war and was sad to learn otherwise. She told our vigil volunteer about her family member who has just come back from active duty in Iraq with horror stories, having seen things that he would only allude to, too terrible to detail. She recently started attending church there but said it would be impossible to come back after learning that the church did not oppose the wars, as she had somehow presumed. This story brings a valuable point; our mission is always to be addressed to the people inside the church, not to passersby, less they misunderstand who we are.
One of our vigil members had more impact than all the rest of us; he is a long time member of Scottsdale Bible and he joined us on the picket line outside for all three services, introducing himself to each touring pastor and deacon as a member of the church. How can it help but have an impact on them? Our goal for every church is to cause not only walk out but tell others why.
The mass killing of children in Lebanon, Gaza and Iraq seems to be trickling down to the perceptive few. But the most hardened liars (like Pat Robertson) at the pulpits of the many celebrity churches continue to feed out their terrible Pharisaic message which goes something like this:
“The killing in Lebanon, Gaza and Iraq (even in Abu-Ghraib and Guantanamo) is not really killing because the Arab-Muslim people bring it upon themselves by not loving the right God and by failing to understand that Israel is God’s Chosen People and its destructive path is God’s will on the way to Armageddon.”
Pat Roberson chuckled with undisguised delight Monday on the 700 Club when he told of the massive damage to Lebanon, and stated with incredible callousness: “I have been looking forward to this for decades.”
Robertson rationalized the killing of the children and suggested they somehow brought it on themselves. There was not even a hint of compassion. He justifies every Israeli act, and sees each bomb as another step toward the End Times. Lebanon makes him chortle in foul mirth at the very thought of its total destruction on the path to Armageddon. He seems sure the world is being pushed into the Rapture that it will surely rescue him.
SBC Pastor Darien Bennett sent out the same message over CBS affiliate Channel 5 TV; it is the false and terrible story coming from dozens like John Hagee over self-proclaimed “Christian networks” like TBN and CBN.
Not all those who contacted us wore a friendly demeanor. Dr. Holland and I were confronted by a passerby who apparently lives across the street from the back parking lot where we were stationed I will call the visitor “Arnold,” who was a self-appointed defender of the church, the Israelis, the wars, and the Jewish race-religion. Arnold was cool and accusative.
What set Arnold off was in a small sign I held that read “NO MORE WARS FOR ISRAEL.” The sign means exactly what is implies, it is not offered with any Mel Gibson style apologies. It is meant to state that every war in the last two decades has furthered the Israelis’ interest and hurt everyone else’s interest, including our own. Our sign means the same thing Mel Gibbon is reported to have told the LA cops, though it would have been better for him had he said it while sober and supported his statement.
Arnold sounds like Michael Savage or Michael Medved. He reeled off the standard demands in quick staccato: “ARE YOU ANTI-SEMITIC? ARE YOU A HOLOCAUST DENIERS? DO YOU PUBLICLY DENOUNCE HEZBOLLAH?”
Here is the answer I tried to give him: My friend Cesar Aharon, who is now a Christian but was once a Jew said: “anti-Semitism is a dirty name Jews call those whom they do not like.” (Arnold was undaunted). “NO, I WANT TO KNOW, DO YOU HATE JEWS?” he persisted, with a strange arrogance to his brain prying.
My Answer was something like this, though not this clearly, making me wish I would have been better prepared for Arnold’s surprise at church:
“No I don’t hate all Jews because that would make me a fool. Many Jews say they hate the killing that is going on as much as I do; but I despise every Israeli and American Jew who support the killing of innocent people in Gaza and Lebanon, as well as these Christians in this church who know about it and do nothing. By “despise” I do not mean I hate them, but I do hold them in contempt. They are worse than child molesters and wife beaters because these latter misfits of society are often unwell mentally. War enablers are lower than animal life because animals are true to their natures. God will judge them and, especially those who think there is no hell. Where do you fit in, Arnold?”
I refused to get involved in Arnold’s Holocaust questioning. But in hindsight here is what I have told him had I been prepared for his strange visit:
“Holocaust is going on in Lebanon right now and Israelis are just as guilty of it as any person in the Third Reich could have been. Why do you want to quibble over a 65 year old holocaust when we have a new one right now.”
“Surely you agree Hezbollah started the conflict?”
It is here Arnold introduced something new that is becoming rote for all Zionists. Hezbollah is being vilified as monsters. It is standard technique of the bully who has to vilify his victims or he will run out of victims. “He hit me…he spit on me…he took a bite of my sandwich. He made a face at me…” and on and on it goes as with every good bully. With Israel, Hezbollah and Hamas are the agitators who justify Genocide against whole populations. Hezbollah is the “weapon of mass destruction” or the villain “Saddam Hussein” that justify mass killing.
Arnold provided a valuable lesson. Hezbollah is locally organized including in its number many displaced Palestinians and sympathizers in Lebanon. Its followers have formed a resistance to the ongoing 55 year-old gulagization and exiling of their kin. Dr. Abu Hamza describes some 500,000 Palestinian refugees living in Syria in refugee camps, who, most probably, would support Hezbollah. “Hezbollah” is framed into a hate word by Israelis, the US media, and by Arnold. He demands: “You certainly can not side with Hezbollah, can you?” Arnold knows if he can discredit Hezbollah he can justify Israel’s murders in Lebanon and Gaza…this is the Hezbollah tactic.
We need to understand the occupation and resistance. The Israeli pattern is, “you kill a soldier, and we kill ten civilians.” It has been going on for 58 years. On Sunday July 30, Israel took reprisals against civilians because on Wednesday prior it suffered military losses of nine Israeli soldiers killed and 27 wounded. Besides killing four UN personnel Israel deliberately destroyed a three story building full of refugees’ children. Olmert said: “I think it needs to be clear that Israel is not in a hurry to have a cease-fire before we reach a situation in which we can say that we achieved the central goals that we set down for ourselves.” I know Mr. Olmat’s goal, I saw it in Gaza.
Arnold’s questions (he told us he was Jewish as if we could not guess) were classic and should be recognized by every one of us. Strangely, Arnold’s charges (they are really not intended to be questions) are almost the same comments we get from the more radical Christian-Zionists. But Arnold thinks Armageddon and the rapture are Christian gibberish and laughs at Christians for believing it. Zionistic-Jews and Zionist-Christians throw up the same offense (not defense) mechanism. This is because world Zionism has captured the Christian Right and shaped their theology.
Every person, especially pastors, needs to be told that those who support un-Christ like serial killings in the name of God have the blood of the innocent on their hands. They are not to be excused because they are Jewish, or because they are a pastor of a large church. Most of the Christian Right is not concerned about preserving life, therefore it cannot follow Christ. Religious leaders bear an added responsibility for veracity because they are trusted by those who put them on the Pulpit. They must be called to account directly in front of their congregations. This is the mission of Project Strait gate, it is our way of following Christ. He said, “feed my sheep.” Join it.
